


Somewhat Implied

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Drama, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-12-24
Updated: 2005-12-24
Packaged: 2019-01-19 02:45:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12401457
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: '...she wondered if there really was such a thing as normal magic.' In the course of a year, Lily Evans finds answers, questions, and a few other things along the way. Lily/James, post-Hogwarts.





	Somewhat Implied

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

  
Author's notes: 1  


* * *

**Prologue**

Disclaimer: JKR owns the characters, the books, the situations, and my soul. I own the spaces between.

  
\--

It was the gentle tapping sound that woke Lily Evans up from a work-induced slumber.

 

She had been dreaming hazily about a meeting to which she was late, late, late, impeded by giant snowballing snowflakes that had kept hitting her temperamentally, as if thrown down from the sky by a particularly angry cloud of some sort. It had then continued to unravel, as dreams often do, as the snowflakes became the faces of her classmates from her Hogwarts days, all trying to tell her something before they inevitably hurtled to their mushy, wet, unrecognizable deaths. It was the buzzing chatter of their words, and the repeated _‘fwoomp’_ when they hit her that began to call to her attention this couldn’t _possibly_ be a reality, and the fact that James Potter’s bespectacled and snowflaked head had hit her three times only underlined the matter. But there it was, that tapping sound, as another snowball hit her, and another, and another, as they called out, “Lily. Lily. Lily!”�

 

“ _Lily!_ ”�

 

Startled, the girl in question lifted her head from a stack of papers she’d been reviewing, and turned in the general direction of the speaker. “Hmm?”�

 

“Oh, good, you’re up,”� a bookish looking blonde said, carrying a large pile of files and papers in her arms. “You need to be more careful, you know the department heads are just looking for a reason to fire you ‘straight-out-of-Hogwarts’ types.”�

 

Lily blinked sleepily, and replied, “What time is it?”�

 

“Eleven thirty,”� her companion replied with a light smile. “I figured I’d wake you up before you slept through the ringing in of the New Year. Dreadful they’re making us work today, isn’t it?”� She scrunched up her nose, and picked up an envelope at the top of her heavy looking pile of papers. “Anyway, this was delivered to me, but it’s addressed to you, so there you go.”�

 

Lily took it wordlessly, turning the envelope over. “Did you open it?”�

 

“Of course not,”� the girl at her desk said flippantly. “The owl that delivered it was in bad shape, and it’s no wonder, given this weather; horrid, really, that anyone would be sending post in a storm like this. It’s inhumane, is what it is.”� She paused, seeming to notice that her red headed friend wasn’t paying attention. “Lily?”�

 

Startled, Lily looked up. “Hmm?”�

 

“What’s in the message?”�

 

Flustered, Lily quickly shoved it back into the envelope, receiving a paper cut in the process. “Nothing. It’s just a letter from… from an old friend. Holiday greetings, New Year’s wishes, that sort of thing,”� she said, hastily slipping the envelope into her pocket. She frowned. “What are you still doing here, anyway? Weren’t you out to see that writer bloke… Lovegood, wasn’t it?”�

 

“Hmm, yes. Daniel’s a lovely person. He sent me flowers. And a note.”� 

 

She smiled vacantly and pulled a slip of paper out of her pocket. It was on a small, three by two inch white card, the sort that came attached with a bouquet or a gift basket, only the writer had left a lengthy note in cramped writing, with the receiver’s name and the sender’s name in a different color of ink. 

 

“Holiday greetings, New Year’s wishes, that sort of thing,”� she said with a cheeky smile. Lily returned it tiredly. “He’s really very sweet. A bit eccentric, but sweet.”�

 

“I’m glad for you,”� Lily said simply, and smiled at the blonde. There was a second of silence in which Lily checked her watch, then- “Oh, damn- it’s already eleven thirty, isn’t it? I’m going to be so late… I really didn’t mean to fall asleep, I was just catching up on some work, and I just… fell asleep, and now I’m going to be _so_ late. I’ve- I’ve got to go, Nina, can you cover for me? I’ve finished through most of the files, I was just going to turn it in, but I suppose I could leave it till tomorrow…”�

 

“Got a bit of a White Rabbit complex, haven’t you?”� Nina said mildly. Lily stared at her blankly, in the middle of reaching for her scarf. “ _Alice_ _in Wonderland_? Lewis Carroll? Anyway, I was on my way out myself; did you want to stop by and get a drink with me and my friends? It’ll be fun. We’ll be dead drunk by midnight and start singing ‘Auld Lang Syne’ to the wrong lyrics. Probably rude and inappropriate ones.”�

 

“Does _anyone_ know the words to that song?”� Lily murmured, and shook her head, buttoning her coat and wrapping her scarf. “Anyway, I’ve already got plans… I’m meeting some old friends from school.”�

 

“And you’re late already, I take it?”� her friend said, looking a bit amused as they walked briskly out of her office and down the hall.

 

“Very much,”� Lily replied, glancing at her watch again, and pushed the door open as they stepped into the freezing cold. The crystallized little flakes flurried around them, amidst the drizzle of rain, several managing already to land in her hair and on her coat, though with less vengeance than they had in her dream. Shaking her head slightly, Lily wished she had thought to bring an umbrella of some sort. “I’ll see you later, then?”�

 

Her friend nodded, and Disapparated into the night.

 

Taking an extra second to smooth down her hair, Lily paused, before giving it up for a lost cause and Disapparated as well, feeling the crush of snow leave beneath her feet and, after three seconds’ worth of breathless nothingness, solid ground beneath her feet.

 

“Hello,”� a vaguely familiar voice growled behind her. Lily started, and turned to see two figures in the darkness of the room. Alastor Moody stumped forward from the shadows and peered at her suspiciously. “You’re late.”�

\--

The dimly lit room was filled with a variety of people- some she recognized from her school days (which, she reflected, really weren’t so long ago), others she’d only read about in the papers. There was a buzz in the air, something lying beneath their idle chatter, the atmosphere electric with it. Standing by the table, she picked up a glass of New Year’s Butterbeer Brew, swilling the champagne flute slightly. Holding it up against the light, she surveyed the room through the golden, sparkling, bubbling drink.

 

“You missed the big speech,”� a voice at her shoulder said.

 

Lily whirled around, blinking in surprise. “Sirius!”� She spilled a drop of her drink in the process, as she greeted him enthusiastically.

 

He smiled, stepping forward slightly. “Hey,”� he greeted softly. “How’ve you been?”�

 

It was just the sort of question one asked someone they hadn’t seen in months and wasn’t quite sure what else to say. She smiled to herself, and wondered how many times she’d be asked that in the next twenty minutes. She wondered how many times she’d ask it herself.

 

“Fine, fine,”� she nodded, taking a sip of her drink. “You?”�

 

“The same.”�

 

She smiled, and took another sip of her drink. A quietness fell between them, the sort of pause that comes between two old friends who have suddenly become acquaintances, and she stared at her glass idly to pass the time, searching for something to say. “So what did I miss?”�

 

“Oh, you know… ‘You’re working for a great cause’, ‘some of us may die in the battles to come’, ‘hope springs eternal’, that sort of thing. He might as well’ve read us the St. Crispin’s Day speech, for all we were hearing. ‘We few, we happy few,’”� Sirius said easily, reaching for a celery stick on the platter behind her. “We band of bludgered.”� He gave a short, cynical laugh at his own joke and regarded her. She smiled slightly, a bit uneasily, as she sipped her drink. 

 

It had been, after all, over half a year since she’d last seen Sirius Black. They had been friends, she remembered, on quite good terms, actually, once they had overcome their differences. In the end, though… she shook her head slightly, as if shaking away the faint tinkling of distant memories creeping up.

 

“So have you seen…?”� Sirius trailed off, leaving the person she was supposed to have seen unnamed, though she could be left in no doubt as to whom he was referring to. Of all the people to bring _him_ up, she really would rather not have it be Sirius Black.

 

“Who else is here?”� she asked, not-so-discreetly avoiding the question. It was only after the words left her mouth that she realized, by way of diversions, it wasn’t much.

 

“Peter, he’s over by the Longbottoms, you remember them, a few years ahead of us at Hogwarts, I think…”� Sirius jerked a hand in the direction of the large Christmas tree trimmed with tinsel and glass ornaments, glowing slightly in the dim light of the room. Beneath it, the Longbottoms appeared to be chatting with a pudgy fair haired boy animatedly. “… and Remus, he’s… somewhere else, I dunno where that git’s been all night, really. And James, of course,”� Sirius added belatedly, nodding slightly at her. “Have you seen him yet?”�

 

Lily shook her head. “I haven’t seen any of them. I came late.”� She smiled slightly. “I think Moody was about to murder me when he saw me. Quite a bit peeved, actually.”� She lifted a hand to her neck idly, her fingers seeking out the silver pendant of her necklace instinctively. “He tried to arrest me, then tried to poke his wand in my eye to see if I was Polyjuiced. Not sure how that might’ve helped him figure it out, but…”� she trailed off, coloring slightly. “Anyway, I haven’t seen anyone yet.”�

 

Sirius smiled at her. “Well, you should say hi, at least. James, he…”� he frowned. “He’d be glad to see you again.”�

 

“Oh.”� Lily blushed, searching for words that wouldn’t sound too perfunctory or too familiar. “Me too.”�

 

She finished her drink and walked away.

\--

Her relationship with James Potter was an odd one, Lily mused, as she surveyed the room from her own withdrawn corner.

 

They had had the sweet sort of teenage romance in their last year at Hogwarts, after three long years of bicker and banter. He had been sweet and attentive, charming and infuriating, and so very… _James_. In short, he had been everything she imagined her first love should have been. But after graduation… well, she reflected, they had at least lasted a month and a half out of school.

 

It had been a constant pushing and pulling, and with a war brewing in the background, they had both dedicated themselves with their respective jobs, trying to make a difference. At first, it had gone along well enough… having someone who shared her hopes and ambitions, someone who would listen and understand, it was more than she’d been able to expect all those summers at home. But then, slowly, they had seen less and less of each other, meeting every other day, then just on weekends, then exchanging brief, clipped letters, then not seeing each other for a full three weeks. Looking back, it all seemed so sudden, but then, to her memory, it had been a rather slow kind of growing apart. In the end, when they had finally been able to arrange a lunch meeting, it had been to break up.

 

She still remembered what they’d ordered. She’d asked the waiter for a glass of honeyed tea and a turkey sandwich, and waited. 

 

And waited.

 

He’d arrived some twenty minutes late, apologizing as he always did when he broke one of their meetings, kissed her quickly by way of greeting, then stared into his chicken breast gloomily. 

 

“We’re breaking up, aren’t we?”�he had asked her, with a sad sort of defeated smile he had never worn before. He had taken her silence to be an answer in the affirmative, and nodded to himself. “Well, I can’t say I wasn’t… well. Best of luck, Lily.”� Then he’d stood and kissed her softly on the cheek, then walked away.

 

It had been the last time she’d seen him in seven months.

 

She supposed she could say they’d ended things amicably, but truthfully, she wasn’t sure how they’d ended things. It had seemed abrupt, somehow, with a touch of regret, but it had been, finally, undeniably over.

 

Of course, she still kept a tab on him, from time to time… working in the Department of Experimental Charms, she’d received more than one memo from the Misuse of Magic Department on unauthorized, non-Ministry Approved charms being performed at his apartment. 

 

She remembered the first time she’d found a little pink slip of paper on her desk, reading, “ _James Potter, at 4:35 a.m. today, performed a non-Ministry Approved charm in his London apartment._ ”� It had come with a little rush of shock over seeing his name again, following with wonder at what on earth he could have been doing at four thirty in the morning. She had Apparated to his new apartment, gotten all the way up to the front door, and had simply stood there, staring at the chipped and peeling green paint of the door, for a full ten minutes. In the end she had Disapparated back to her office, destroyed the memo, and made a mental note never to pass on one of them to her advisors.

 

It was an odd thing to do, she supposed, but it was her way of assuring herself that they had, in fact, ended on friendly terms.

 

She hadn’t really ‘gone out’ with anyone after James, though there were a few men here and there she’d met for a dinner or lunch, a few for a date or two, though they had never amounted to much. There was the distraction of a war, after all, and she had never found much time for such matters, particularly not when she knew her attentions were needed elsewhere.

 

And now here she was, playing a waiting game with herself, for that inevitable moment when they’d meet again.

 

Shaking her head, she distractedly turned to join the crowd, resolving to make the most of the evening. In her haste, she collided into another body, knocking her drink to the ground. As the liquid seeped through the carpet, turning the lush, holly, red to a darker shade of wine red, the stain was covered by several sheets of papers, fluttering down from someone’s clutch.

 

“Oh, bloody…”� she cursed at her own clumsiness, barely taking note of the person before her, stooping to help. The papers were hastily stuffed into the stranger’s hand, and the stain magically removed.

 

“I’m sorry, have you seen Remus Lupin?”� he asked, handing her a conjured napkin as she stood. “He’s disappeared off to somewhere, and- oh.”�

 

Lily blinked as she turned, meeting the bespectacled and bemused eyes of one James Potter.

 

“Hi,”� she said softly. “How’ve you been?”�

\--

“I- you… I’ve been fine,”� James said distractedly. He ran a hand through his hair quickly, a habit he hadn’t quite outgrown over the last two years, she noticed. “Did you get my letter? I only just sent it yesterday, and then the storm started, so I was afraid the owl might-”�

 

“Yes, it just came in before I left for the meeting,”� she nodded. Reaching in the pocket of her robes, she pulled it out. “The owl that delivered it was in fairly bad shape, I think one of my friends took it in… I’m sure she’ll send it along its way once the storm’s over.”�

 

James smiled briefly, shoving one hand from his hair to his pockets determinedly. “You look great. Not that you don’t... always. Look great, I mean. It’s just… you look… Oh, sod it,”� He  muttered to himself, loosening his collar slightly. “So how are… how are things?”�

 

“Great. Things are… things are good,”� she replied, nodding. She frowned, wondering if perhaps she’d been nodding a bit much in the past few minutes. “I just received a new assignment at work, which, if I do it well, should land me a title bump, at the least, and we’re making some progress on researching in new charms for…”� she trailed off, tilting her head and studying his face. He had every appearance of listening intently, one hand in his pocket, the other around a few papers she’d knocked over in running into him. Still, though, she realized she had been speaking to exhaustive lengths, at least for the last twenty seconds of their meeting.

 

“You didn’t really need to know that,”� she shook her head, with an apologetic smile. “Sorry, I… I prattle on like an idiot when I’m nervous.”�

 

“I remember,”� he said softly, with a slight smile. He colored slightly, then added, “Not that I think you’re an idiot, of course.”�

 

She laughed slightly, meeting his eyes for a moment before sliding off to study the room. “Your tie,”� she said awkwardly, “it’s not…”� Her eyes flitted towards the poorly tied, uneven tie around his shirt collar, and she gave him a small smile.

 

 “Oh,”� he glanced down at his tie before meeting her eyes again. His mouth lifted slightly in an embarrassed smile as he replied, “I’ve never been very good at… at that sort of thing.”�

 

She nodded and cast her eyes down again, tapping her glass unconsciously as he fumbled with the knot. There was another pause in the conversation as she grasped around for words, looking around the room, at decorations, at furniture, and, lastly, at him.

 

“How are your parents?”� she asked, with an attempt at a smile. She began to wonder if there really had been a time they’d been able to talk about everything and nothing, to hold a conversation for hours; it was beginning to seem impossible. Perhaps she had imagined it.

 

He swallowed slightly. “My father’s been alright, and my mother…”� James lifted a hand and scratched the back of his neck awkwardly, silent for a short interval. “They’re fine.”�

 

She nodded (again, she noted), and stared into her drink, before speaking again. “I… I’m sorry, I never wrote to you in so long… It just never seemed like the right time, after…”� She shrugged, glancing up at him. “I’m sorry.”�

 

“It’s fine,”� he answered, looking away briefly. “It probably wouldn’t have been… well, given the circumstances. We weren’t exactly on the best of terms.”�

 

“We weren’t?”�

 

He smiled wryly. “No one breaks up on the best of terms, Lily.”�

 

There was a stretch of silence as he glanced at his watch and she glanced around the room, observing the assembly of people around them. She turned to him, then, and he stared back, an indescribable expression in his eyes. “I missed you… afterwards,”� he said softly.

 

“Oh.”� She blushed. “I missed you too.”�

 

It was odd to say, and even stranger to hear. There was a strain to her voice, she realized, slight and nearly unnoticeable, though she was certain he’d heard. Her words sounded cold to herself, even, despite her sincerity, and she regretted it. She did miss him, she knew; she missed seeing him everyday, she missed arguing with him, she missed having him as her best friend. 

 

She missed _him_.

 

When she didn’t offer anything more, he smiled awkwardly, and said, after a pause, “Well… I, ah, should go. Find Remus.”�

 

She nodded.

 

“It was nice… seeing you again,”� he added, over his back.

 

She smiled slightly at his retreating back, and finished her drink. Staring at the empty champagne flute with a frown, she muttered a quick refilling charm and resolved to take her drink outside. 

 

It really was unbearably crowded in the room, and she was beginning to feel claustrophobic.

\--

“Lily? Lily Evans?”�

 

Lily started, turning at the voice.

 

She had spent the last seven minutes sitting on a porch swing in the back, freezing herself entirely, as she’d forgotten how to perform to Warming Charm. A shame, she noted, as she was supposed to be one of the top Charms students in her year, and she’d forgotten a simple charm she’d learned in third year. As a result, she’d been amusing herself with shooting gold sparks from the tip of her wand, reminding herself of the fire sparklers her father had been so proud of showing her back in fourth year. He’d thought of it as bringing a bit of ‘normal’ magic back into her life.

 

Teetering on the swing slightly, she wondered if there really was such a thing as normal magic.

 

She’d drawn a butterfly, a balloon, a star, and was in the midst of drawing a lightning bolt when she was interrupted by someone at the back door, calling her name.

 

“Yes?”� she turned instinctively, her wand still giving off sparks beside her. “Remus!”�

 

A tired looking Remus Lupin smiled at her from the doorway. “Eight minutes to New Year’s. I thought maybe I should warn you, Mad Eye’s been given a new camera for Christmas, and he wants a photo of the whole Order before midnight. Or, as he said, before we all ‘disperse and get ourselves killed’. Cheerful man, isn’t he?”�

 

“Brilliant, though, from what I’ve heard,”� Lily smiled, as he walked over to sit beside her. “How’ve you been? Feels like I haven’t seen you in ages.”�

 

Remus shrugged. “After that whole mess with James, and you and Sirius not speaking, I didn’t think…”� he scratched his neck awkwardly, frowning. “That is, I didn’t think you’d miss the company.”�

 

“Not at all,”� she said softly. “I missed you terribly.”�

 

“Well, that’s nice to hear, if not only for my ego,”� he smiled at her. “Really, though, I wish I’d known that sooner, or else I’d have written. I already feel like a prat, and now…”� he trailed off, studying her, and tilted his head to the side. “Hang on, have you seen James yet?”�

 

Lily laughed. “Yes, I have. I think he was looking for you, actually.”�

 

“Yes, well…”� Remus nodded distractedly and looked ahead, clearly thinking. “He told you, then? About his mum, I mean?”�

 

“His mum?”� Lily frowned. “No, he didn’t… Is something the matter?”�

 

Remus turned sharply. “He didn’t tell you?”� She shook her head and he exhaled deeply, his breath evaporating foggily before them. He glanced down at his own calloused hands and shoved them in his pockets, shaking his head. His voice adopted a lower tone, rambling unconsciously, “Bloody prat. Of course, I suppose… but still… he really is quite thick sometimes. Unbelievable. Bloody git.”�

 

Lily blinked confusedly as Remus continued to mutter beneath his breath, standing now, words like “bloody”� and “unbelievable”� being said at intervals between indistinguishable mutters.

 

“Remus, I have no idea what you’re talking about, but if you keep muttering like that, I’m afraid I’ll have to call St. Mungo’s,”� she said at last, looking up at him from her position on the swing. He stopped the stream of curses and glanced down at her curiously, an odd look in his eye. “What?”� she frowned. “Do I have something on my chin?”�

 

“No, it’s not… it’s…”� Remus sighed, turning to meet her eyes. “James’s mum passed away, Lily. About two months after you and he… separated. He was a mess really, after that, and we couldn’t, that is to say, _he_ couldn’t…”� He trailed off as he let the enormity of his words sink in, before continuing, “So you can understand, I hope, why he didn’t write? He was sorry about everything, but I think he was angry, a bit, not at you, specifically, but at the way things were, so he didn’t… he _couldn’t_ … It’s just… it was a totally shit time for him, and he couldn’t bring himself to ask you for anything, after everything, and he and Sirius weren’t speaking for a while, and then his father was always calling on him, and it was just… it’s not entirely his fault, you have to understand.”�

 

Lily blinked. “Sorry, I… James’s mum, she…”� she paused, frowning. “Why are you telling me this, Remus?”� She frowned, blinking away the snow from her eyes. It was still falling, the rain and snow, powdering the ground with white and raindrops. She wondered vaguely when it would stop. “Why are you making his excuses for him?”�

 

Remus opened his mouth and shut it, groaning weakly. “James… is a prat,”� he said, finally. “He was going to tell you, really, he was, but I don’t think he was ready, at the time, to see you, after everything that happened, after everything went to hell… It was just a shoddy time for all of us, Lily, you can’t really blame him.”�

 

“I…”� Lily closed her eyes, contemplating. “Mrs. Potter… how did she…?”�

 

“Illness, of some sort,”� Remus said beside her, staring bleakly into the snow. “James never went into the specifics with us.”�

 

“And the funeral?”�

 

“It was quiet,”� he answered, his feet swaying slightly as the swing moved beneath them. “She would have liked it, I think. There were flowers, and Sirius… he made a nice speech.”� Remus paused, and the inevitable silence was prevented by the creak of the swing. “It was sunny, though. It’s odd, whenever you think of funerals, you think of rain, and whenever you think of London, you think of rain, but… it was quite nice weather. Funny, how things work out.”�

 

“Not so funny, really,”� she said at last, meeting his eyes.

 

“No, not really,”� Remus agreed softly. They were silent for a few more seconds, before he said at last, “We should go in… Mad Eye, he’ll be wanting to use his new camera.”�

 

Lily nodded wordlessly, standing. Her cloak was beaded with small drops of wetness, whether from the rain or melted snow, she didn’t know. Unsure just how sad she should feel, and whether or not she should be expressing more sorrow at the news, she hesitated, glancing at Remus. He was staring still at the swing, unseeing.

 

Shivering slightly, she moved towards the door, listening to the slight sound her feet made on the snow-powdered ground.

 

“Lily.”�

 

She turned, and Remus was standing behind her.

 

“Could you… could you not mention any of this to James?”� he asked quietly, moving closer. “It’s been nearly five months, and he’s finally… well, not over it, I can’t say, but he’s… he’s not a mess, anymore. If you’d seen him when it first happened… I just… I just don’t want to drag up the subject again with him, after everything… Lily?”�

 

She lowered her eyes, exhaling. “Remus, I can’t…”� Shivering, she glanced up again to meet his gaze. “I… yes, I promise.”�

 

He nodded, swallowing slightly. “Thank you,”� he murmured, pressing a hand on her shoulder, and they moved toward the door again.

\--

On their third date, she had kissed him, she remembered.

 

James had kissed her once before, which had lead to their first date, and he had kissed her quickly on the cheek at the end of their first and second date, but it wasn’t until their third date that she had taken the initiative to kiss him.

 

They had been on the road back from Hogsmeade, their first ‘real’ date, outside the confines of Hogwarts, and she remembered he had taken the time to dress for the occasion. He had put on a clean, unwrinkled shirt, made an attempt to comb his messy hair, and, as she remembered most clearly, he had been wearing a tie.

 

The date itself hadn’t been any bit memorable. He had been too nervous to make his usual jokes, for some reason, and she, taking his cue, had been mute for most of the evening. They had left their dinner almost untouched, and had walked back towards the castle in silence. As they walked, it had begun to drizzle… not rain, so much as to warrant their running, but it had drizzled. The late October sky had been too dark to show the hazy grey she was sure it would have been beneath the dark, but it had been disappointing, nonetheless. 

 

Somewhere along the road, finally, he had muttered, “Ruddy tie. My mum wanted me to wear it… completely ridiculous, I don’t know what…”� 

 

There had been a slight slump of his shoulders as he said it, his clumsy fingers trying to adjust the poorly tied, complicated knot she could only assume one of his friends had helped him with. He had been disappointed, she remembered thinking, and he hadn’t looked at her.

 

“James,”� she had interrupted him, and he had stopped in attempting to strangle himself with the offending tie to meet her eyes. 

 

She hadn’t been quite sure what to say, at the obvious failure of the evening. An apology, perhaps, for having wasted his time, or maybe an offer to stay friends; she couldn’t remember what she was going to say, just then. But he had stopped to listen to her, as he always did whenever she spoke, with the appearance of giving her every bit of his attention, and she’d been at loss. So, she’d stepped forward and taken his tie from him, deftly undoing the knot and retying it, her fingers brushing his skin every few seconds, though she couldn’t for the life of her remember if it’d been on purpose or by accident. A bit of both, she supposed. 

 

“There,”� she had said softly, looking up at him.

 

He hadn’t said anything in response, just stared at her, in confusion, in uncertainty, and she remembered feeling quite cold just then. 

 

“Lily, I…”� he hadn’t been able to finish, either, but it had called to her attention that they must seem rather stupid, just standing there. 

 

So, she had tugged him down by the tie and leaned up to kiss him. He had been surprised, she could tell, but she hadn’t quite minded (and neither had he), tasting the drizzle on his lower lip, feeling her own chapped lips brushing his as he kissed her back. It hadn’t lasted very long, no more than three or four seconds, but he had been smiling slightly when they’d broken apart.

 

“I like your tie,”� she’d murmured then, feeling foolish, trying to suppress a smile as she met his eyes.

 

He’d laughed, quite loudly, and, for a fleeting second, she remembered being afraid he’d been laughing at _her_ , but then he’d smiled and said in a low voice, “I like _you_ ,”� and bent down to kiss her again.

 

Looking back, Lily supposed they had been every bit the naÃ¯ve couple. Now, a little over a year since that night, they had aged beyond their years. 

 

Between the beginning of her seventh year to the end, thing had happened to change them, to age them. In a brief six months, people had died, people had disappeared, students had been withdrawn from school, they had learned to dread the news, then, later, to become indifferent to it. They had grown used to the owl post flying in with the worst sort of news, yet they had never ridded themselves of the growing anticipation of dread every morning as the Ministry owls flew towards their recipient. There had always been an uncertainty of who was next, who would receive the Ministry’s letters of ‘sincerest regret’, ‘deepest sorrow’, and promises of ‘swift and immediate action’ against those who had committed the crimes.

 

Leaving school, at least, they had been rid of the owl post in the morning, witnessing another student’s very public grief, feeling guilt at the relief it wasn’t them, and then sympathy for those who had suffered. It had been one thing she remembered being glad for, after graduating.

 

This war, it hadn’t been the sort of thing she’d imagined in the magical world, when she had first received her letter. But then, so few things were.

 

“Lily?”�

 

She shook herself out of her reverie to turn to the speaker, blinking in surprise. 

 

“James,”� she greeted quietly. It was odd, meeting him again, after having just spoken about him to Remus, and she frowned at the memory of the conversation. She forced a smile (which she hoped hadn’t come across as too pained), and said, “I suppose Moody’s rounding everyone up for a group photo, then?”�

 

He nodded wordlessly. “There was something I…”� he trailed off, as the buzz of idle chatter grew louder.

 

Behind him, she noticed a trail of people entering the room, ushered in by a growling voice saying, “Come on, people, I haven’t all day, and I want this picture before we all die. Which, given the circumstances, might not be too long. So you must understand my hurry.”� The smiling, unconcerned crowd walking in seemed unaffected by Alastor Moody’s grim words, and took up their places in the room for a picture, as if they had already known where to move.

 

Remus walked in, followed by Sirius, who was in deep conversation with another young man Lily recognized to be Gideon Prewett… or perhaps Fabian, she had never quite been able to discern the difference. Something about the freckles, she remembered.

 

She was distracted then by a tap on her elbow, and found James beside her again, as he said hurriedly, “Lily, there’s something-”�

 

He cut off abruptly again as a person jostled past them, followed by the recognizable figure of Peter Pettigrew, whose eyes grew as he spotted them. “Lily! James!”� he greeted.

 

James gave him a half-hearted wave, and she couldn’t help being disappointed at their being interrupted. She had very little doubt as to what he wanted to speak to her about, given her conversation with Remus, but she preferred to hear it from him. 

 

“Hello, Peter,”� she said at last, and tried not to give any sign of dissent as he seated himself between them.

 

“How’ve you been, Lily?”� he asked amiably, and she smiled at his enthusiasm, unconsciously forgiving him for the interruption. “It’s been terribly long since we’ve seen you last, hasn’t it been? What, about… seven months, almost, isn’t it? Merlin, that’s a long time. And to think, we might not have seen you for even longer, if it hadn’t been for this meeting. Terribly exciting business, don’t you think? The Order of the Phoenix, I mean. Makes me feel like a Gryffindor, for once,”� he said with a small, self-deprecatory laugh.

 

“Yes,”� she agreed, nodding. “Quite.”�

 

She was saved the necessity of coming up with a more adequate response by Moody’s loud, “Alright, everyone in their places; I want this picture before the camera breaks… or before we die, whichever happens first.”� He gave a coarse laugh at his own joke.

 

Peter frowned beside Lily, whispering to her, “He’s been saying that all night, really. Bit morbid, isn’t it?”�

 

“Bit annoying, more like,”� she replied with a touch of a smile. Peter had always had a certain wide-eyed incredulity she had found both annoying and amusing back at school; it hadn’t left him. “And I can’t imagine it as much of a compliment to whomever it was that gave him the camera.”�

 

Peter nodded, smiling. Beside him, James shifted uncomfortably.

 

“Alright, I’ve programmed it to take the picture in fifteen seconds, so be prepared,”� came the growl of Moody’s voice, as he hastened over to them. There was a quick, “Budge over, Hagrid, they won’t be able to see… and Doge, take off that ridiculous hat, for once…”�

 

He was interrupted, then, by someone saying good naturedly, “Come on, Moody, before we all die, eh?”�

 

There was a ripple of laughter, and Moody growled menacingly, before he joined them and smiled stiffly as they counted down.

 

The camera gave a flash, the moment was frozen, and the crowd remained.

 

“Fifty seconds to New Year’s!”� someone shouted.

 

Peter turned back to her, apparently eager to continue the conversation.

\--

“Oh, yes, quite,”� Lily agreed, uncertain as to what she was agreeing to, but altogether too tired to care.

 

_Thirty…_

 

She wondered, staring into her glass, if the new year would be any better than the last. This year, having been filled with the usual impending doom and gloom of situation, had been building up to this moment, it seemed, though she couldn’t be any bit sure as to what.

 

“So, any New Year’s resolutions?”� Peter asked beside her.

 

_Twenty-six…_

 

“Oh,”� Lily glanced down at the glass of New Year’s brew in her hand and shook her head with a mild smile. She couldn’t even remember last year’s resolutions. Though, more than likely, there hadn’t been any. “I could never keep those. You?”�

 

_Twenty…_

__

Peter shrugged. “Be a better person?”� he suggested amiably.

 

She laughed, and he let a small chuckle escape as well. It was just the sort of thing he would say, it seemed, and she realized how much she had missed him for it. “I dunno, seriously? Just… make someone happy, for a while. It’s a difficult thing, these days.”�

 

Lily shrugged with a small smile, glancing at him before leaning forward and nudging him slightly. “Or you could try to eat more fruit.”�

 

_Fourteen…_

 

“Almost New Year’s,”� Peter murmured, glancing around him, as the buzz of chatter died and was replaced by the inevitable countdown.

 

_Ten…_

 

Lily nodded, and laughed softly to herself, more than anything. “Almost,”� she agreed loudly, over the crowd. 

 

There was an idle moment in which she surveyed the crowd around them, abuzz with anticipation and excitement, and felt a rush of disappointment. It was bizarre, being in a room surrounded by people she should have known, but by some mistake of fate had become strangers to her in a matter of months. She hadn’t been sure what she’d expected, but this… this wasn’t it. She paused, considered, then stood. “Peter, I’ve… I’ve got to go, actually.”�

 

“What…”� He swiveled around from the clock to face her, frowning. “Where are you going?”�

 

_Six…_

 

Shaking her head, Lily set down her glass. 

 

“See you soon, Peter,”� she called over her shoulder.

 

_Four…_

 

As she picked her coat easily off the tall coat rack, Lily glanced at the room behind her.

 

The newly inducted Order members were mingling and mixing, bursting out in an enthused, “TWO… ONE… HAPPY NEW YEAR!”�

\--

Someone, in a distant corner of the room, broke out into a drunken chorus of ‘Auld Lang Syne’, and others joined in.

 

It was an odd, happy, bubble of hope and joy and just… happiness, which she couldn’t quite understand. It was as if they were being pushed over a cliff, and singing all the way down. She couldn’t understand it, but there was a sense of dread, which she couldn’t stand any longer, being stifled and suffocated by everyone’s spirits and the gleeful crowd… She shook her head. Perhaps they were right to be celebrating unconcernedly as they were- she really shouldn’t be thinking about these things, not at times like this.

 

Glancing at her watch, the minute hand moved slightly, to signal the end of the first half minute of the New Year. She laughed slightly to herself, and pushed the door open, wrapping her coat tightly around and donning her scarf.

 

It would all be there tomorrow, the day after that, the week after that, the month after… For now, she had to leave. She had to sleep.

 

The ground was covered by two or three inches of snow, by now, a flurry of flakes swirling around her, sparkling in the light of her wand. They glinted as the light bounced off them, creating her own little frosted world, a small, flaky, winter wonderland. 

 

“Hello, friends,”� she murmured with a smile, bending down to scoop a small clump of snow off the steps. The dry, powdery snow fell into her ungloved hands and left a small trail on the steps.

 

With a sudden burst of energy, she turned and threw the powdery clump of snow into the air, watching them explode with the wind and shower down quickly. Small flakes came down to whiten her hair, other fell in clumps around her and on her shoulders, and others were carried quickly away in the flurry following it.

 

“Lily!”�

 

She turned, surprised.

 

James Potter stood on the steps, no coat, no scarf, no gloves, and clearly out of breath. “I just… I just wanted to say…”� he exhaled deeply and shivered slightly. A misty stream followed his words, completing the surreal moment. Behind him, she could still hear the faint chorus of drunken voices singing “Auld Lang Syne”�.

 

He stepped closer to her, though they were still separated by several feet, and started again. 

 

“I just wanted to say…”� he paused, glancing at the snow in her hair, and she thought, for a moment, something touched his eyes before it passed and they were their steady, unreadable expression. “Happy New Year.”�

 

She waited, and he didn’t continue. Disappointed, she stepped backwards slightly with a sad sort of smile. “Happy New Year, James,”� she murmured softly, before turning and starting quickly down the walk.

 

There would be time for thinking and talking, time for her to rationalize his words and her own, time for her to be used to this immovable gulf between them, but not tonight.

 

As she walked quickly away, the dim echo of voices faded, along with the light of the headquarters. The snow still crunched beneath her feet loudly, sparkling quietly with the dim silvery moonlight, in the absence of her wand. Her gloved hand reached in her pocket, closing around the letter she had received just half and hour prior.

 

In the silence, she recalled the one line she could remember from the song, humming softly to herself.

 

“ _Should auld acquaintance be forgot, in days of Auld Lang Syne…_ ”�

  
\--

Author’s Note: What’d you think? Reviews shall make me squee. 


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